Smt. Deepa vs The State of H.P. and Others

Deepak Gupta, J.—The petitioner filed this petition before the erstwhile H.P. State Administrative Tribunal. On the abolition of the Tribunal this petition has been transferred to this Court in terms of the Himachal Pradesh Administrative Tribunal (Transfer of Decided and Pending Cases and Applications) Act, 2008 and now registered as CWP(T) No. 5870 of 2008.

By means of this petition the petitioner has prayed that her services be regularized from the date when her juniors were regularized and she be paid arrears.

The undisputed facts are that the petitioner was engaged as Safai Karamchari by the Panchayat Samiti Dehra which at the relevant time was running the bus-stand Jawalamukhi w.e.f. 14.4.1983. It is also not disputed that on 31.3.1993 the control of the bus-stand was handed over to Nagar Panchayat Jawalamukhi in pursuance to an agreement entered into between the Panchayat Samiti and the Notified Area Committee, Jawalamukhi. The stand of the respondent is that w.e.f. 1.4.1993 the petitioner was engaged as Safai Karamchari on daily wages. Admittedly, the petitioner was a daily waged employee with the Panchayat Samiti and her services were never regularized by the Panchayat Samiti. She alleges that services of certain persons who were junior to her have been regularized. This averment has been denied by the respondents. Admittedly, the petitioner was a daily waged employee with the Panchayat Samiti. A daily waged employee cannot claim continuation of service and benefit of daily waged service rendered in one organization in any other organization unless there is a specific agreement to the said effect. A daily wage employee can only continue in service as long as work is available. Once the bus-stand was handed over by the Panchayat Samiti her services would have automatically been terminated. Therefore, her employment with the Nagar Panchayat would be fresh service.

In view of the above discussion, I find no merit in the petition. In case, the petitioner is otherwise eligible for regularization, the Nagar Panchayat shall consider her case for regularization in accordance with law. No costs.